


how to train your blanket burrito

by sheithism



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, M/M, Post-Canon, Sick fic but the fluffiest possible kind
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-30
Updated: 2018-07-30
Packaged: 2019-06-18 12:15:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15485538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sheithism/pseuds/sheithism
Summary: "Morning, sweetheart," Shiro murmurs, carding his fingers through Keith's hair, which is long enough to curl just a bit at the ends. Keith pushes into it like a cat, the whole blanket burrito wriggling a little as he curls closer, tucking himself around Shiro like he can trap him in bed just like that.Or: in which the war is won, Keith and Shiro finally rest, and Keith isnota morning person.





	how to train your blanket burrito

**Author's Note:**

> So: one of my favorite VLD concepts is letting Shiro and Keith rest, so have a post-canon fic where they do just that. I like the idea that they’re both people who constantly have walls up, but with each other they can truly be vulnerable. Also Keith’s character development from being a “fully clothed and ready to go” sleeper in S1 to curled up with his cosmic wolf and mom in S6 definitely inspired this fic, featuring said cosmic wolf who I’ve named Blink.

After Voltron, after they quite literally save the universe, the paladins all split up for some well deserved rest and relaxation. Lance goes back to Varadero to spend a few weeks wrassling his many nieces and nephews, Hunk and his family go on a food tour of Italy, the Holts start work on an intergalactic communications system, and Allura and Coran finally kick back and spend some time enjoying the sights, sounds, and foods of Earth.

For Keith and Shiro, it was kind of a no brainer. They spent a week visiting Shiro’s family in Kyoto, during which Shiro manfully tried not to stare at how the yukata his aunts insisted in putting Keith in cinched his tiny waist and emphasized the breadth of his shoulders. Blink became fast friends Aunt Kiyoko’s shiba inu, and it took Keith’s sternest look to keep Blink from teleporting Haru onto the plane back to the States with them.

After their whirlwind tour of Japan and all of Shiro’s many exhausting but well-meaning relatives showering them in love and attention nonstop, they went back to Keith’s home with plans to do nothing but sleep, uninterrupted and undisturbed. 

The first night back in Keith’s desert home, Shiro comes to a delightful realization: when Keith finally lets himself fully relax and shut down, the constant combat readiness he’s been in since this - they - started melting away, Keith is basically every adorable sloth video come to life.

Twin tatami mats in his aunt’s living room hadn’t exactly been a romantic locale, so with the whole place to themselves and Blink relegated outside with the chickens, Shiro finally gets to press Keith into his sheets and cherish him properly. Time is never really something they’ve had before, but now it’s a luxury they can finally afford.

Because they have the day off for the foreseeable future, Shiro wakes up slowly, luxuriously, the sun already high in the sky. Keith is wrapped around Shiro’s left side like a barnacle, digging his pointy little chin into Shiro’s chest. Shiro blinks in surprise - before, when they’d shared a bed, Keith had curled into himself and slept light as a feather, the smallest shift or sound waking him up. Now, as Shiro tries to subtly wiggle his way out of Keith’s grasp, he just mumbles incoherently and snuggles closer, hair adorably mussed and cheeks flushed with sleep.

While there’s nothing he’d love more than to stay just like this, Keith is surprisingly heavy, Shiro’s left leg is definitely asleep, and he really, really needs to pee. After an undignified amount of shimmying, Shiro extracts himself. He can’t help but smile down fondly at the picture Keith makes, his sleep shirt riding up to expose the soft belly Shiro had happily put on him, plying Keith with mochi and takoyaki and all the favorite childhood foods neither of them had time for the last three years.

Shiro pads into the kitchen and gets a pot of tea started. On the Castle of Lions, the smell of Altean tea would always draw Keith into the kitchen, and while Earl Grey didn’t have quite the same acerbic tang, the promise of caffeine in the air was usually enough to kick Keith into gear.

After an hour, Shiro starts to worry. Blink is pacing the kitchen and making plaintive eyes up at Shiro, clearing wondering where his beloved Keith was, and why he wasn’t playing with him at this second. Because Shiro has always been weak to cute things, he makes Keith a cup of tea - no cream but an almost inadvisable amount of sugar, because Keith has a secret sweet tooth he hides by tricking people into thinking he takes his tea black - and wanders into the bedroom. 

Keith's moved into the warm spot Shiro had left behind, curling around his pillow like aggressively cuddling it will magically make Shiro reappear for another few hours of sleep and sleepy cuddling. The sheets are twisted around him, his legs starfished as far as they can go, and his hair is a disaster zone. When he hears Shiro come in, Keith’s eyes open into tiny, angry slits.

Keith grumbles something that could, charitably, be considered "caffeine." Luckily, Shiro is basically a saint, so he just grins and holds the mug aloft.

"Sit up for me, babe, and it's all yours." Keith flushes bright red in response and... huh.

Shiro let's Keith commune with his tea for ten minutes while he cooks up some eggs, and eventually the smell of food draws Keith out of the bedroom. He stumbles out, looking groggy and grumpy and mostly asleep, and promptly walks straight into a decorative end table. Keith doesn't even seem to notice, just keeps going, straight into the back of the couch.

Oh god... What if Shiro literally fucked Keith stupid last night?

\-------

The next day, for science, because he did graduate with a double major in astrophysics and flight, Shiro tucks Keith neatly and chastely into bed. The next morning, he throws open the blinds and lets the sun from the window beam directly onto Keith’s face. It still takes Keith sixty-eight minutes and one broken picture frame to get out of bed.

So, not the sex then. 

\-------

The thing is, it wasn’t like this before. When saving the universe dictated that Keith needed to be up, he was able to roll out of bed, blade at the ready, immediately. In close quarters with the other paladins - most of whom didn’t know how to knock - he was always a light sleeper, sleeping dressed and with his guard up. But for vacation Keith, for universe-saving-sabbatical Keith, he happily flopped into bed in nothing but boxers, and getting him out of bed was a ten step process.

Shiro maybe takes advantage of Keith's zombie-like state, because morning Keith is probably not coordinated enough to smack him for being a giant doting dork and embarrassing Keith with his cooing. Shiro finds himself smiling fondly and calling Keith darling, unable to help himself. Keith's adorable like this, sweetly sleepy and pliant, his very bones melted in relaxation, all the silent strength he carries as the paladin of the Black Lion stripped away.

Exhausted-from-saving-the-universe Keith, though similarly nonverbal, won't wordlessly ask Shiro to pet him, but vacation Keith will. It's something only Shiro gets to see and have, and he's fiercely grateful for it.

Slowly but surely, he puzzles out Keith's morning zombie impression. Although, each day, it's a little different. Three weeks in, Shiro comes in with tea at noon to find Keith has gathered all the numerous comforters and wrapped himself up like some sort of blanket burrito, one hand and one foot poking out, his head sticking out of the top. His cheeks are sleep-flushed and he looks vaguely annoyed, as he always is when Shiro comes to rouse him.

"Morning, sweetheart," Shiro murmurs, carding his fingers through Keith's hair, which is long enough to curl just a bit. Keith pushes into it like a cat, the whole blanket burrito wriggling a little as he curls closer, tucking himself around Shiro like he can trap him in bed just like that. 

Keith opens one eye - making a little progress - and mumbles something incoherent, the one hand not trapped in his blanket burrito flapping feebly. 

"You can have tea once you sit up, babe." That's always the first step in awakening the adorable sleeping dragon: ply him with caffeine and use it to bribe him into some sort of vertical state. 

Keith frowns bearily at this. Shiro rolls his eyes. 

"I'll just leave this here," Shiro says, laughing a little. He places the mug on the far nightstand and gets up to make Keith breakfast. 

While the pan heats up, Shiro pokes his head back in and sees that Keith has flopped onto his back and managed to extricate one arm and twos legs from the blankets. Progress. Blink is sitting by Shiro’s feet, alternating between looking longing at the bacon Shiro is frying up and longingly at Keith, who still hasn’t woken up enough to shower Blink in cuddles.

Shiro gives Blink the all clear to go bother Keith, which he does with relish, teleporting onto the bed and digging his cold nose into Keith’s cheek. He yips and nips and licks at Keith, nudging an arm and then a leg in an effort to mobilize him. 

Even with Blink’s help, it takes thirty minutes before Keith is fully upright and mobile, hair a mess and clutching the chipped ceramic mug like he's afraid someone will take it from him. And, like he does every morning, he walks into the end table and then overcompensates, stumbling into the back of the couch on the other side. Eventually, though, Keith manages to seat himself at the table, wobbling a little as the chair’s one slightly shorter leg gets the best of him. Shiro rewards him with a nose kiss and a breakfast burrito (and people say Shiro doesn’t have a sense of humor) as well as a second cup of tea.

Keith smiles at him, dopey and sleep-hazy, and gives him a nose kiss of his own.

(Keith, still not particularly coordinated, ends up catching Shiro's eyebrow. He doesn't even notice, just blithely tucks in.)

\-------

That night, sprawled on the couch with Keith half in his lap, Blink curled up at their feet, and one of Keith’s favorite alien conspiracy theory documentaries playing on the TV, Shiro notices something he probably should've cottoned on to earlier. Keith's T-shirt has ridden up, revealing just the edge of a bruise above the waistband of his sweatpants. Shiro reaches over and tugs the pants down a little, revealing what must be a table-inflicted bruise. Keith, pliant and sleepy, just shoots him an odd look and returns to the movie. 

Looking at the deep purple bruise blooming across Keith's hipbone, Shiro decides that he's probably going to have to make a few changes, since, well... Keith is kind of a permanent fixture in his life now, especially now that he knows that that life together is hopefully going to be a long one. He called his Aunt Kiyoko yesterday, and all she wanted to talk about was Keith and when she was going to see him again. Krolia pinged them from the diplomatic mission she and some of the more senior Blades were on to oversee the peaceful splitting of the Galra empire, and when Shiro tried to leave the room to give them some privacy, she insisted on hearing all about how his family was doing. Kolivan had even, very awkwardly, attempted to give Shiro some semblance of The Talk before they all parted ways.

So, Shiro embarks on a mission. He idly considers googling how to babyproof the living room before he realizes that fully-cognizant Keith would probably dropkick him with no hesitation for doing something like that. Instead he settles for moving the couch forward a few inches and relocating the end tables, clearing a path from the bedroom to the kitchen table. Then he moves the bureau, which Keith sometimes confused with the bathroom door, to the other side of the bedroom. 

While Keith is out teaching advanced flight classes at the Garrison, Shiro even sands down the edges of their newly installed kitchen counters to rounded corners after Keith got a particularly nasty bruise on his upper thigh while trying, a little too ambitiously, to scale their new breakfast bar stools while still mostly asleep. 

The house - coined “The Desert Loveshack” by Lance and Pidge - is now suitably Keith-proofed, the couches moved to create a clear path, any decorative tables with pointy corners gifted to them as intergalactic thank yous relocated far from wandering half-asleep Keiths, and all wobbly stools fixed and perfectly leveled.

That night as Keith is drifting off Shiro surreptitiously checks Keith’s shins and elbows for any new bruises, and smiles to himself when all he finds is smooth skin and new constellations of freckles.

\-------

Keith's post-breakfast routine isn't much more coordinated or dignified than the pre-breakfast one. 

While he's clearing the plates, Shiro hears a muffled banging, and then the buzz and clatter of Keith dropping his electric toothbrush for the third time.

Keith wanders back out, still looking vaguely confused like he doesn't understand why he's awake. 

"Come here," Shiro says, smiling helplessly, and Keith joins him on the couch. Shiro gently wipes away a smudge of toothpaste on his chin before kissing him, soft and sweet.

"Good morning," Keith finally says, two hours too late. 

Shiro just laughs and kisses him again.

\-------

Coda:

Shiro and Blink wake Keith every morning with cuddles and caffeine at the ready, coaxing him, a warm and grumpy little blanket burrito, into the waking world. At this point, four months in, Shiro knows exactly how to handle morning Keith, adorable sleeping dragon that he is.

He is not, however, prepared for Keith when he’s sick.

Keith is pathetic and kind of adorable, glaring balefully up at Shiro from where he’s curled in bed, nose bright red and a tissue stuck in his hair. It is, objectively, disgusting, but Keith just looks small and pissy and Shiro is so, so gone.

"Hey," Shiro murmurs, sitting down on the edge of the bed and fishing the probably-used tissue out of Keith’s hair and into the bin. Oh, the things he’ll do for love.

Keith opens his mouth, but no sound comes out. Instead, he looks at Shiro like he’s personally responsible for Keith being sick. 

"Babe, it’s probably not a good idea for you to go to flight training," Shiro says, threading his hands through Keith’s hair. Keith’s grown it out long enough that he can put it up into a cute little ponytail, and he’s kept it that length mostly because the first time Shiro had seen him with his hair up he’d been so flustered he dropped Beatrice, who had proceeded to squawk loudly and peck at Shiro’s toes as revenge. 

Now, though, Keith’s face is a hilarious mixture of pleased at being called babe, and also affront at the mere implication that he would ever willingly miss an opportunity to school some Garrison upstarts in how to fly.

"I know, Keith, but you’re really in no shape to lead a class right now. I’m not sure the Garrison’s helicopter empty nesters would be too happy with you coughing on their precious children." Keith wrinkles his nose at the thought of another bored housewife trying to both yell at and flirt with him simultaneously, but tries to sit up regardless without unwrapping himself from his blanket burrito. It results in him flailing awkwardly and then just giving up and burrowing his adorable but snotty face into Shiro’s thigh.

Shiro just sighs and continues stroking his hair, letting Keith nap, snuffly and sweet, in his lap until he really can’t hold off leaving for class himself any longer. He tries, with the utmost stealth, to shift Keith off his thigh and onto the pillow, but Keith just cracks open one grumpy, crusty, squinty eye and glares up at him.

"Baby, I really have to go now," Shiro says, regretful, gently moving Keith to the pillow. He scoops up a box of tissues and settles it beside him. "I’ll be back before you know it, alright?" he says, but Keith’s eyes are already closed and he’s snoring softly, Blink hopping up onto the bed to curl up against Keith in Shiro’s absence.

Shiro just smiles dumbly down at him and then presses a quick kiss to the tip of Keith’s bright red nose. He then manfully speedwalks to his speeder because he had a reputation to maintain, and Takashi Shirogane leader of Voltron was never late.

Severla hours later, Shiro gets back from the Garrison with a tub of chicken noodle soup and Keith’s favorite guilty pleasure cookies from the bakery in town. He expects to find Keith, still in burrito form, passed out in bed, warm and snuffly and kind of adorably pathetic. What he gets, instead, is Keith proudly curled inside the most elaborate blanket fort known to man.

It’s extensive, built from two couches, three chairs, and countless pillows and blankets. Keith sits, proudly ensconced in his pillow nest with a tissue box in his lap and a sleepy Blink lounging beside him. There is, Shiro notes, a little pocket of space in Keith’s pillow nest with Shiro’s name, literally, written on it with a red sticky note. And that’s such a Keith thing to do, sweet and bossy all at once. Keith just looks so adorably pleased with himself, his nose red and a feverish flush across his cheekbones, honestly still half asleep and yet somehow having managed to bend the living room to his will. 

"Babe, did you really just…" Shiro trails off, unsure how to express a) his incredulity at Keith, who had been all but passed out three hours ago, managing to create this masterpiece and b) his confusion as to why Keith had made a fort in the first place. Not that forts weren’t awesome, they were - they just didn’t seem like a Keith sort of thing.

"My dad used to make forts for me whenever I was sick," Keith croaks. "They’re… nice. Warm. Safe."

Shiro feels himself soften. He really wishes he could have known Keith’s dad, the man who had raised the adorable, grumpy, stubborn love of Shiro’s life. Shiro’s a little old fashioned and would’ve liked to ask for his blessing, the black titanium ring burning a hole through his sock drawer, but Krolia had taken one look at Shiro and known, and anyway, no one’s blessing really mattered as long as Keith would have him. 

Shiro looked down at Keith, curled in this little safe haven all his own with snacks and tissues and entertainment, wrapped in every blanket they own. And, well, he’d created a space for _Shiro_ in his safe haven, a declaration as small and serious as Keith himself.

Keith wiggles one arm out from under his many blanket capes and pats the spot next to him imperiously. “Come here,” he says, bossy as always. “I want cuddles.”

And Shiro, of course, obliges, kissing Keith once, quickly, red nose and plague-ridden lips and all. Keith is grumpy and kind of smells a little musty and keeps digging his pointy elbows into Shiro’s stomach because Shiro is a movie talker and Keith is not, but it’s perfect all the same. 

After the movie, Shiro let’s Keith poke and prod at him until he is the perfect body pillow and then let’s Keith feverishly drool all over his favorite fleece.

He looks at Keith’s hand, fisted in their little blanket nest, and thinks, _soon_.

**Author's Note:**

> Join me on [tumblr](http://www.sheithism.tumblr.com) for more Sheith and self-indulgent fic.


End file.
